Oklahoma men’s basketball guard BJ Edwards can suit up for the Sooners after a temporary restraining order was granted Friday in Cleveland County District Court, an OU spokesman confirmed to the Tulsa World.
Edwards, a transfer from SMU, had been out of action after previously exhausting his college eligibility. With the TRO in place, he is now immediately eligible for the Sooners, though he still has to secure his eligibility through a preliminary injunction at a future court hearing.
The fight over Edwards’ status started after he lost a previous lawsuit in his home state of Tennessee. He has been practicing with Oklahoma while waiting for a ruling on his eligibility this season.
The NCAA changed its approach this summer, adopting a new “3-for-5” eligibility rule that limits athletes to playing five seasons of college sports within a five-year span. But the association did not grandfather in athletes from the 2022 high school class - players who had just graduated college and had only played four seasons of NCAA sports - into the new rule.
That decision helped trigger lawsuits such as Edwards’ against the NCAA, aimed at giving him more eligibility. Edwards joined a suit that also included OU baseball player Dayton Tockey and transfer football players Danny Okafor and Stephen E. Austin and D’Vontae Wise, all of whom have joined the OU football roster since getting back in September.
OU coach Porter Moser said earlier this week that Edwards’ defense, especially, is “an exciting addition to the Sooners’ roster for this season.”
“I see a physical guard,” Moser said. “He can put W[his] chest on somebody and really level somebody off.
An SEC athlete. Talking to many ACC coaches that coached against them, they said we 100% talked about BJ Edwards’ defensive presence in our scouting meetings.
Like, he has a presence defensively. … He does a little bit of everything.
You average six rebounds and five assists as a guard, like, those are great numbers when you get a guard like that. He can play on the ball, he can play off the ball.
He’s a very versatile guard with that. … He has locked your up guarding the dribbler, which we need in this league.”
Moser also said Edwards has had to bring a little gambling edge to his game because opponents expect him to be aggressive.
“For me, I’ve had to also let him do his thing a little bit. He’ll gamble because he anticipates, and it’s just, I don’t want to harness that.
Like, sometimes it’s not the most fundamental thing because he’ll jump in a passing lane and take himself out, but he gets more than he doesn’t. … So I think he’s definitely gonna impact us on that end.”
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Broken Arrow brings a dangerous offense led by quarterback Shamar Banner, a University of Tulsa commit, while Bixby answers with a roster that includes several Division I commitments of its own. For the Spartans, this is a chance to protect their No. 1 spot and add another statement win to a season that has rolled along without a blemish, but Broken Arrow has every reason to believe it belongs on the same stage. [Read more 🡒]